This invention relates to manual cleaning compositions for hard surfaces in the form of a substantially water-free surfactant-containing active substance encapsulated in a water-soluble or water-dispersible material.
Conventional detergents/cleaners are generally formulated as thinly liquid to viscous aqueous liquids. On the one hand, a liquid formulation such as this is generally intended to achieve relatively uniform mixing of the active substances in the formulation; on the other hand, the liquid formulations enable the user, when preparing the actual dishwashing or cleaning liquor, to add the detergent/cleaner to the water used for dishwashing or cleaning without coming into hand contact with the product. Hand contact is often undesirable because, in concentrated form, the formulations frequently have an irritating effect on the skin that feels unpleasant to the user. However, the disadvantages of liquid formulations lie, for example, in the fact that a generally large amount of water normally has to be added to the product in order to incorporate solid active ingredients. Unfortunately, this is inappropriate for ecological and economic reasons. The presence of water in the formulations leads to a reduction in the active substance content because, basically, water does not have the requisite cleaning effect. Accordingly, the active substance content per unit weight or volume of the product is reduced by its formulation as a liquid.
Even relatively highly concentrated, commercially available liquid products normally still have a high percentage water content. In addition, the user tends to overdose such concentrates in practice.
However, if products of the type in question are formulated as solids, the user has inconveniently to use dosing aids for measuring the quantity to be added with the attendant risk of skin contact with the concentrated product which can lead to the consequences mentioned above.
Accordingly, both liquid and solid formulations of manual detergents/cleaners are attended by the disadvantage that exact, ecologically safe and repeatable dosing is difficult for the user to achieve. This is a disadvantage from the perspective of environmentally friendly application.
The problem addressed by the present invention was to provide a storable dosage form for manual detergents/cleaners which would enable highly concentrated, substantially water-free detergents/cleaners to be used simply and safely by the consumer without any of the disadvantages mentioned above.
WO 94114941 relates to water-based neutral or slightly alkaline machine dishwashing detergents that are free from anionic and cationic surfactants. The machine dishwashing detergents may be accommodated in water-soluble or water-dispersible containers consisting, for example, of gelatine.
EP-A0 261 754 relates to a foam bath in the form of a mixture of amine salts and long-chain alkyl ether sulfates, 25 to 35% by weight of liquid polyethylene glycols and glycerol encapsulated in an elastic gelatine capsule.
It has now been found that certain active substances containing concentrated mixtures of active ingredients such as occur, for example, in liquid water-based manual detergents/cleaners can be encapsulated in storable form in water-soluble or water-dispersible capsules and that correspondingly encapsulated active substances are eminently suitable for use as a manual detergent/cleaner.